HCS SS SCS SB 588, 557, 579, 563, 869, 619, 570, 753, 764, 782,
783 & 890 -- SEXUAL OFFENDERS

SPONSOR:  Bartle (Lipke)

COMMITTEE ACTION:  Voted "do pass" by the Committee on Crime
Prevention and Public Safety by a vote of 13 to 0.

This substitute changes the laws regarding sexual offenders.  In
its main provisions, the substitute:

(1)  Requires the State Highway Patrol to operate a toll-free
telephone number to disseminate information regarding individuals
registered as sexual offenders;

(2)  Requires a licensed health care professional who delivers a
baby or performs an abortion to report evidence of certain sexual
crimes if he or she has prima facie evidence that a crime has
been committed;

(3)  Requires law enforcement officials to notify victims of
reported sexual crimes that they have a right to request a no
contact order be issued against the alleged perpetrator;

(4)  Requires a persistent sexual offenders to be imprisoned for
the duration of the person's natural life without eligibility for
probation or parole;

(5)  Increases the penalty from a minimum of five years
imprisonment to imprisonment for life with eligibility for parole
for the crimes of forcible rape and forcible sodomy if the victim
is younger than 12 years of age;

(6)  Creates the crimes of attempting to commit forcible rape and
attempting to commit forcible sodomy, punishable by a minimum of
five years' imprisonment;

(7)  Expands the crime of sexual contact with a student while on
public school property to include perpetrators who are student
teachers, employees of the school, volunteers of the school, or
people employed by an entity that contracts with a public school
district;

(8)  Expands the crime of sexual misconduct to include knowingly
exposing a person's genitals to another person without consent
for the purpose of sexual gratification;

(9)  Specifies that no sexual offender will be present or loiter
within 500 feet of the property of any school or in any
conveyance owned, leased, or contracted by a school when persons
younger than 18 years of age are present unless the offender is a
parent, legal guardian, or custodian of the person and has
obtained permission from the school administration;

(10)  Increases the penalty for the crimes of enticement of a
child or attempting to entice a child to a term of imprisonment
of no less than five years;

(11)  Creates the crime of sexual trafficking of a child younger
than 12 years of age, a felony punishable by imprisonment for the
duration of the person's natural life without eligibility for
probation or parole until the person has served a minimum of 25
years' imprisonment;

(12)  Limits the definition of "child abuse" to only those
instances in which a person knowingly inflicts cruel and inhuman
punishment on a person younger than 17 years of age;

(13)  Creates the crime of aiding a sexual offender, a class D
felony;

(14)  Removes any individual's name from the sexual offender
registry who committed nonsexual child abuse or was convicted of
felonious restraint or kidnapping when the victim was a child and
he or she was the parent or guardian of the child;

(15)  Allows an individual who is required to register on the
sexual offender registry for a crime that he or she committed
when he or she was younger than 21 years of age or who has
committed certain other crimes to petition to have his or her
name removed;

(16)  Establishes procedures for search warrants where
notification of the existence of the search warrant causes an
adverse result including danger to the life or physical safety of
an individual, flight from prosecution, destruction or tampering
with evidence, intimidation of witnesses, or serious jeopardy to
an investigation;

(17)  Specifies that records sought under a search warrant be
produced within five business days of receipt of the warrant or a
showing of good cause by a foreign corporation that an extension
of time will not cause an adverse result;

(18)  Specifies that any attempt made to quash a warrant must be
made in the court that issues the warrant within the time
required for the production of the records;

(19)  Requires Missouri corporations providing electronic
communication services, when served with a warrant from another
state, to produce records pertaining to customer identification,
data stored by or on behalf of the customer, the customer's usage
of those services, or the destination or content of the
communications as if the warrant had been issued by a Missouri
court;

(20)  Gives immunity to Missouri corporations providing records
sought under a search warrant as specified in the substitute;

(21)  Allows the Board of Probation and Parole to access
information on the home computer of a registered sexual offender;

(22)  Requires sexual offenders to provide the date of their
birth; their physical description and that of their vehicle;
nature and dates of the offenses requiring the offender to
register; and the date in which the offender was released from
the Department of Health and Senior Services, prison, or jail or
placed on parole, supervised release, or probation;

(23)  Establishes conditions and procedures governing the
conditional release of a sexual offender to provide outpatient
treatment and monitoring to prevent the person from being
returned to a facility of the Department of Mental Health because
he or she is likely to commit more acts of sexual violence;

(24)  Specifies that any individual who has been required to
register on the sexual offender registry and commits a third
registration violation will be guilty of a felony punishable by a
term of imprisonment of not less than 10 years and not more than
30 years;

(25)  Requires the Department of Public Safety to establish a
program to distribute grants to multijurisdictional Internet
cyber crime law enforcement task forces and other law enforcement
agencies;

(26)  Requires the Department of Corrections to notify the State
Highway Patrol of any offender who is required to be
electronically monitored; and

(27)  Authorizes the Department of Public Safety to promulgate
rules establishing recommended procedures for the issuance of
missing endangered person advisories.

FISCAL NOTE:  Not available at time of printing.

PROPONENTS:  Supporters say that the bill strengthens criminal
penalties for sexual offenders and clarifies some of the registry
requirements.

Testifying for the bill were Senator Bartle; and Office of the
Attorney General.

OPPONENTS:  Those who oppose the bill say that sexual offenders
are less likely to be arrested for committing another offense
than any other type of criminal.  The offender's only options are
to enter and remain in prison or to be mentally unsafe because
treatment is not a viable option in the bill.

Testifying against the bill were Loretta Van Kort-Warm; and
Motion Picture Association of America.

Kristina Jenkins, Legislative Analyst

Missouri House of Representatives
93rd General Assembly, 2nd Regular Session
Last Updated November 29, 2006 at 9:46 am